


Don't Plan Your Future on Panes of Glass

by indecisiveauthor (ComposerEgg)



Series: Paper And Glass Don't Mix [2]
Category: Subarashiki Kono Sekai | The World Ends With You
Genre: AU-normal life, Angst, Cancer, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-28
Updated: 2015-10-28
Packaged: 2018-04-28 16:29:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,220
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5097440
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ComposerEgg/pseuds/indecisiveauthor
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Joshua is acting strange, more aloof than usual, and before Neku has the chance to find out why, he's gone.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Don't Plan Your Future on Panes of Glass

Josh had that look again, as if a field of fog separated the two of us. He’s been like this for a while now, more aloof and mysterious than usual, and I couldn’t help but be concerned. Josh should be flirting up and down the wall with me, all that fake bravado and confidence just to get on my nerves and tick me off, cuz that’s what friends like us do. Sure, it got annoying sometimes, but _anything_ would be better than this melancholy.

“Hey Josh!? Are ya listening?” I ask, and his head snaps up to look at me, with a smiles that I can tell is as fake as the knock-off colored pencils I’d been trying to use.

“Yeah, I am, you were talking about coming up with a pen-name, right? I don’t see _why_ you’d need one, dear, I think Neku is a beautiful name.” I roll my eyes at him. “Fine, why do you want another name then?”

I grin, setting my sketchbook down on the table, giving up on trying to draw Josh. No matter what I tried, I never could get him down on the page well, his hair looked like he’d just walked through a hurricane, and those eyes could hide any lie behind that stark violet. Not to mention the smug smirk he always gave me, the one I halfway wanna punch off his face, halfway wanna kiss away.

I bounce on the seat a bit before speaking, fully expecting to be judged for my childish behavior, orange streaks moving in and out of my vision as my hair spikes wave around. “Well you see, it’s kinda to keep my art life separate from my real one, I could be an enigma, just like CAT! And you could secretly know it’s me and taunt people about your super inside knowledge! I’m sure you’d love doing that.”

“Yeah, that’d be fun to do. ‘Course, I’d keep your secret. Hell, I could get a pen-name and release music if I wanted to. We could be starving artists together!” I roll my eyes at this, but I can tell something’s up. Something that makes me want to scream until my throat is raw at him, tear at his skin until he opens up and decides to _tell_ me what’s wrong, instead of making me solve his little pointless puzzles like usual.

“Oh please, Josh, you’ll hardly be starving. Your parents are like, billionaires! Hell if we stick to that plan of getting an apartment together, we could just rely on that honestly ridiculous amount of money you have already. With that much money, I’m surprised you haven’t dyed your hair, it’s the same grey color as dirty dish-water.” I smirk, a twist of the lips that looks better on him and not me, if I’m honest with myself, but I can still play it well.

“Now, dear, that’s not very nice. Next you’ll be telling me to wear colored contacts so my eyes aren’t violet.” He steals the smirk right off my face and puts it on his face, tapping my nose to distract me from this petty theft.

“No! I would do no such thing! You’re eyes are really nice, actually!” It takes me a moment before realizing what I’d said, and oh great now he’s probably comparing my cheeks to some flower in his head. “I-I don’t mean it like _that_ , I just meant, from  the viewpoint of an artist, overall, you’re really unique, like your hair and eyes and body, and just, you. Not many people around here look like _you_.”

He raise an eyebrow, piercing me with a faux-serious gaze, because of _course_ he has to keep up this ridiculous act. “Oh, so you’re just using me for my body then? A perfect model for you to play with?”

“Josh! That’s not it at all and you know it!” I squawk, waving my hands in the air between us in distress, earning a laugh in return.

“I know, I know, but it’s ever so fun to see you embarrassed, I just couldn’t resist!” He pauses, then takes out a manila folder, tossing it and it’s contents over the table to me as I eye it with guarded curiosity. “Here, I won’t be here for a bit, so you gotta wait till Wednesday to open that. Didn’t wanna miss your 16th birthday.” It almost looks like he’s hoping not to anger me, concealing his secrets in a blanket of silence well enough that I can’t even try to see what they are.

“Wait, you’re missing my birthday?” I frown, concerned. Ever since I met Josh, he’s _never_ , missed my birthday, arguing at lengths with his family to have this one day free for me.

“Yeah, gettin’ dragged somewhere, you know how it goes.” With that, he stands and waves bye. “That reminds me, I need to go pack. Bye, Neku.”

He’s left me alone in this cafe, this space that’s too small and too big at the same time, the air solid and unrelenting as I try to ask him why, where he’s going, why won’t he be here come Wednesday?

 

It’s Tuesday night, technically Wednesday at 2am, when I get a text from him, the first communication since the cafe.

^I’m sorry, Neku. You can open that folder now. I was a coward till the end, sorry, dear~Joshua.^

I frown, tearing open the folder that has seldom left my side, finding only medical papers inside. Papers with _Patient: Yoshiya (Joshua) Kiryu,_ written on top, and beneath that _Pancreatic cancer. Estimated Time Left: 3 weeks._

The rest of it is a bunch of mumbo-jumbo technical terms, but scribbled at the bottom is a note.

_I’m sorry, I couldn’t tell you Neku. I didn’t want my last days to be full of misery in a hospital and friends moping over my inevitable death. Originally I was planning our cafe trip to be a date, but once I got the test results back, I knew I couldn’t do this to you. Getting a love confession from a dying friend would probably suck, so here, now it’s post-mortem._

_Take care, dear. Who knows, maybe I’ll be a ghost and haunt you for never getting a kiss._

_~Joshua_

I scream. I scream and it can burst eardrums and rattle the glass in my window. I scream until my throat is raw and cry until my face has red-streaks and I’m too dehydrated to muster any more tears. All those plans for the future shattered like glass, that crystal ball much more fragile than originally thought.

My mom comes into my room at some point, but I can’t speak, my voice was stolen the moment I read of Josh’s death. I hand her the paper with the news of death on it as a curl up into a ball. I want to shrink, shrink and become nothing, disappear into the air until the pain is gone and my lungs can expand again, I want to be nothing until the weight in my heart is lifted and I see my best, only, friend again.

I’m shaking and sobbing and I can’t get up, if I make one wrong move the world comes crashing down again. Funny how one little letter can transform the future into a nightmare.

**Author's Note:**

> The second version of the POV exercise for my creative writing class! Yeah, the dialogue is all the same, sorry bout that, but hey, it had to be the same story. I love feedback, so comments and kudos are great!


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